In recent years, various types of airbags have been developed and put into practical use to ensure occupant safety from motor vehicle accidents. An airbag inflate and deploy in an extremely short time from a moment of a vehicle collision, receives an occupant, and absorbs an impact to protect the occupant. Base fabric for airbag needs to have excellent mechanical properties to inflate and deploy. For example, a side airbag, which is stored in a seat and protects the waist and chest of an occupant during a lateral collision accident, needs to have not only a function as a barrier preventing a deformed door and other things from hitting the occupant, but also a function to receive motion of the waist and chest of the occupant due to a reaction force of a collision, at the same time.
To meet performance requirements for an airbag base fabric, for example, WO 2012/026455 A1 suggests an airbag base fabric intended to have a higher airtight performance with reduced air permeability, a faster deployment speed, and improved impact absorption for protecting an occupant. Also, JP 2002-266161 A suggests a fabric airbag intended to have low air permeability, high flexibility, and excellent compactness and also have high shock-absorbing ability, using a raw yarn having flexibility and high toughness. In addition, JP 2011-202340 A suggests a fabric for an airbag intended to provide a light-weighted airbag module developing without loss of a gas.
In recent years, the demand for better shock absorption property of airbag base fabric has been increasing to cope with various types of collisions and a high-speed collision. Especially in an accident involving severe deformation of a vehicle body and to protect a heavyweight occupant, airbag base fabric needs to absorb large collision energy more efficiently. However, the airbag base fabrics described in WO '455, JP '161 and JP '340 may not absorb such large energy sufficiently. It could therefore be helpful to provide an airbag base fabric capable of absorbing collision energy sufficiently, an airbag and a method of manufacturing the airbag base fabric.